Crossroads
by msjgatsby
Summary: Paige finds herself at Mike's crossroads.


Author's note: I am still writing Safe and working on a cowritten project with another writer here. But sometimes when procrastinating, I get bit by little plot bunnies that won't leave me alone until I write them. Once bit, this one wrote itself.

Rated T for sex, but nothing too explicit.

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**Crossroads**

Paige Arkin lies in her bed, eyes squeezed shut tight. Her fingers rake down the muscular back of the man on top of her. She bites her lower lip to keep from crying out, as he penetrates her body again and again with smooth deliberate thrusts.

The room is quiet except for the sounds of heavy breathing and skin slapping against skin. The bed somehow remains silent, even as it rocks from the force, and Paige remembers how she got here.

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"I'm not lost you know."

Paige turns around to see Mike leaning against the hallway wall in the shadows. She's come into the kitchen to grab more beers, and this is the first time her and Mike have been alone together since he had kissed her a few days before and she had called him 'lost'.

"You don't say." Paige opens one of the beers prematurely to take a sip. She's pleasantly buzzed off of alcohol and the feeling of having Graceland back the way it should be; with everyone happy and relaxed around a bonfire. Her family.

"Nope." Mike says, moving away from the wall and walking confidently over to her, casually sipping his beer. "I know exactly where I am. I'm at a crossroads."

"Crossroads, huh?" She grins blithely up at him. God, she'll miss him when he leaves.

"Mmmhmm." He murmurs subduedly. Despite his relaxed tone, he's staring at her intensely, leaning in close. "But I'm not lost. I know where each road goes."

"And where's that?" She's feeling playful and curious. The intensity in his eyes and the small smirk hiding in the corner of his mouth is intriguing her. Mike's a mystery she doesn't think she'll ever solve.

"Well, there's a flight tomorrow morning. Seat A5. If I'm on it, I'm back in DC by dinnertime. Nice apartment. Great pay. No one stabbing me." Both look down to Mike's stomach, and Paige's hand unconsciously comes up to lightly touch the wound that almost took him from her. Her eyes come back up to meet his, but her fingertips stay lightly pressed to his stomach. "Rising up the ranks of the FBI. Everything I've wanted since I was a little boy."

"Sounds nice." Paige says softly, unable to look away from his piercing stare.

"Yeah, it does." His hand comes up to cover hers on his stomach.

"Doesn't sound like much of a choice to me." She laughs nervously, breaking away from his intense gaze. She takes a step backwards, lowering her hand and eyes.

"See you would think so, but, well, there's this _other_ road…" He trails off, and Paige's eyes snap back up to his face, her pulse quickening. "...and I'm not exactly sure where it will lead. But if I take that road, I do know seat A5 will be empty tomorrow."

"Where will you be if not in seat A5?" She asks breathlessly, her heart pounding in her chest.

"With you." He says like it's the simplest thing in the world.

Paige suddenly feels dizzy. How many drinks did she have? She gulps and shakily asks, "So how will you decide?"

"Oh, I can't." He says.

"You can't?" She repeats. She wasn't expecting that response.

"No, only you can do that, Paige."

He is standing close, with a confidence he didn't have when he first came here. She studies him carefully and all that's changed about him in the brief few months she's known him. She thinks about how he's changed her too. How can he trust her to make this decision for him?

"So what's it going to be, Paige? Should I go pack?" He asks, his blue questioning eyes searching hers.

Paige knows her answer.

With trembling hands, she gives him a tender kiss.

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"Mike…" She moans his name softly as her orgasm approaches. She knows she needs to stay quiet. Other people in the house can't discover their secret. She doesn't mean to say his name. It just slips from her lips.

"Lisa..." Is the only response.

Even though it's not her name he's saying, Paige still finds comfort in the arms of Paul Briggs. There's no pretense between them. They both know this is nothing but loneliness. He's not Mike, and she's not Lisa, but for an hour they can both forget who the other is and be with the ones they love. Even if it's not real.

Briggs is making love to a ghost but, in a way, so is Paige. Mike may be alive, but he's all the way across the continent.

She had to let him go. If he had stayed, they would have only hurt each other. There's no love in Graceland.

But there is sex.

So once every few drunken nights or so, Paige slips into Paul Briggs' bedroom. Or vice a versa. It doesn't matter. They close their eyes, think of lost loves, and use each other's bodies to remember and forget.


End file.
